NRA Conference @ Croke park

dublin | history and heritage | opinion/analysis Friday March 31, 2006 11:52 by Chris murray - TaraWatch dotliath at gmail dot com n/a 0877765289

Constructing a template for the EIS by Margaret Gowen, Archaeological consultant for the M3 project.

The NRA conference entitled : Building a Better Road Environment (30/03/06) was addressed by Margaret Gowen of
Gowen and co. Archaeological Consultants and project managers. The methodology of preparing an EIS used by the project management team in the M3 Route selection procedure was adapted as a template for procedural applications and re-hashed for the NRA conference. One could derive from this that it is considered a sucessful model for future road projects.

The item presented at conference was boldly entitled;
Guidelines for the Assessment of Archaeological Heritage Impacts of National Road Schemes. Or how to ensure that resolution is achieved in advance of construction. The Environmental Impact assesssment or EIS stage is crucial
because it is only then that route change is considered.
The introductory briefly covered the legislations that pertain specifically to monuments: NMA 1930-2004,the Granada convention and International Council on Monuments and Sites, (ICOMOS).

It became interesting when the criteria for route selection and the issue of mitigation were introduced.The basis for the nature, focus and presentation of the EIS were to ensure consistency during the constraint study, the route corridor selection study and the integration of findings and results.
How is a monument defined? Since there is no legislation
defining a complex as a monument , it is defined as a landscape containg monuments: recorded monuments, high visibility sites, low visibility sites and sites with no visibility and no surface expression. The legal team representing the NRA in the recent judiical review case claimed that a National Monument per se did not exsist in legislation 'unless something was to be done with it' . Margaret gowen attended the whole case and took copious notes. How does one go about the constraints study; three items were introduced at this point: Methodologies ,Desk Study , the use of records , maps and public domain information lists. The windshield survey, (a drive past) and an aerial survey. items collated from these surveys are presented as part of the constraints study.
Mitigation: ' Mitigation by avoidance where possible' this is achieved by resolution in advance of construction.
In the choice of route it is imperative to mitigate by excavation,
recording and publication of monuments. The excavation requirement assessment to be achieved well in advance of construction.All collated informations will be fed into the EIS for publication. procedures include the team deciding on the scope of the archeological heritage survey .
Communications between the project managers should be initated with NM section of the dept of environment at the route corridor selection stage. Communications should be initiated with the statutory agencies at the EIS stage.
There you have it,how to stich up the Route selection and EIs process. reference was made to the Code of Practice which is a non-statutory implement and therefore in this published document easily transcended.
The document was preceeded by a disclaimer;

While every care has been taken to ensure that the content of this document is useful and accurate, the NRA and any contributing party shall have no legal responsibility for the content or accuracy of the information so provided or for any loss ........ thank you to Ed for offering me the recently vacated seat of Mr Cullen and facilitating the writing of this article.
It is evident that there is no Code of Practice covering the issues published in these articles and legislation does not protect our archaeological heritage.